meh

What do you get when you pair a cold, rainy day with a bored human, a cranky cat, and a borrowed digital camera? Well, seeing as all I wanted was a picture of the cat and I together, the answer could have been fairly simple but, this being me and all, it was anything but.

I don't get it. Given that the cat's preferred activity 99% of the time is standing on my chest, nose pressed to mine while meowing incessantly, a happy cat-human portrait shouldn't have been too challenging. Instead, I got this



and this



and this


I wouldn't exactly call it fun but it was most definitely fuuunny. With all the meowing and flying fur, you would have thought I was making him eat the camera, not sit for it.

I'm not bored anymore but he's super pissed. See the second picture? His red eyes? That has nothing to do with the camera, it's because he really IS that evil.

Meh.

quotes

This morning's paper carried an article about Richard Bradshaw, the former General Director of the Canadian Opera Company who passed on last week. I've had a mini-crush on him since 1995 when I discovered him at the outdoor opera series held at the Harbourfront each August.

I'd just returned from my first overseas trip and was experiencing the kind of world weary despair best experienced by 20-somethings freshly returned from their first European adventure. I was stuck in the backwaters of North America, alienated from my friends who'd managed just fine in my six month absence, and depressed by the fact that nothing had changed. Well, nothing except for my knowledge that EVERYTHING was SO much better in Europe. Grasping for something 'cultural' to do, I read about the outdoor opera series, got dressed in my favourite, purchased-in-Barcelona dress and headed downtown.

It was lovely. Richard Bradshaw was charming and witty and made me enjoy opera. He also, with each wave of his conductor's baton, helped me fall back in love with Toronto. I've had a soft spot for him ever since. I'm sorry to hear that he's passed on. The article quoted him as saying: "The only irresponsible option in art is to avoid taking risks". Love that. And don't think the sentiment is limited to art, I think it transfers every bit as well to life.

In the same newspaper I read another quote which I've heard in varying terms for years without ever knowing that the original source was Mark Twain:
"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bow lines, sail away from the safe harbour. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover."

This quote is one of the truths I return to when I'm trying to make a decision - will I regret NOT having done this in 20 years? If the answer is 'Yes', I do it. If the answer is 'I don't know' I give it time. 'I don't know' usually has fear beneath it - fear of the outcomes, the fall out, making a mistake - and fear has a short life span. If I give it time, the answer comes.

Which leads me to the last 2 years. I took the biggest risk I'd ever taken. I fell in love. Maybe not a big deal to some but for me it would have been far less terrifying to do just about anything else. Falling in love was hard. And it didn't have the fairytale ending I was so sure it should have had. And I'm so, horribly, all-encompassing sad about that. Not depressed, not unhappy, just sad. The kind of sadness I didn't realize it was possible to contain in one body. The kind of sadness that I didn't know could co-exist with happiness, excitement, laughter, release and a sense of freedom - because I'm those things too, there's just a sense of sadness lurking beneath it all. I don't want this. I'm not quite sure how I am containing it. But I am.

I am and I have no regrets. In 20 years I'm not going to have to wonder what would have happened if I'd tried harder. I'm not going to have to wonder what would have happened if I'd gotten on that plane to Finland. I'm not going to have to wonder why I let my fears get in the way of what could have been a beautiful partnership. So yeah, I'm sad and I don't wish for this ending - but I don't have to wonder and I'll never have to regret what I didn't do.

I'm also clearer. Clearer that there is no "but" to real love and understanding that soon I'll stop hoping this isn't really happening and just accept that it happened. I'll be sad until sadness runs it's course and I embrace what life has in store for me next. Through it all, I'll never have to wonder "What if...". There is no what if. I didn't let fear rule my choices.

Which leads me to my last quote of the day, this one from Eleanor Roosevelt:
"You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, 'I lived through this. I can take the next thing that comes along'. You must do the thing you think you cannot do".

philosophy girl

I was really hoping to write this morning. Was hoping that the act of putting pen to paper would help me clarify this mood. This feeling that something is missing - that I'm missing something. Not a person, a...something. A lesson? A sign? An opportunity? I don't know. I kind of like this foggy, daydreaming feeling but I'd also hoped that the feeling of my pen scratching through the pages of my journal would part the cobwebs of my mind and help me see the missing something.

But I can't write.

I'm in my favourite coffee shop with the awesome coffee, free wireless, funky music and wide open doors as opposed to the dreaded air conditioning. Usually its a refuge. Usually I sit, wrapped in the fuzzy arms of the blue armchair in the corner with my legs tucked under me, and I daydream, or write, or read undisturbed for hours. Today it's different.

Today I'm sitting across from philosophy girl. Philosophy girl really wants to be noticed. She really wants us to know that she's immensely hung over from the bottle of wine she had for dinner last night. She really wants us to know that it 'ruins' her life that there's no wine store in her neighbourhood. And she really, REALLY wants us to know that she's working on her PhD in philosophy.

She rattles on about paradigms, about how the "difference between here and there is time", about "we're living in the 'ought' - who decides what 'ought' is?". I remember that feeling. Of being in my early 20's, of being exposed to new ideas, of how exciting it was and how I really thought that I was the first one ever to hear these things, to think these things. I was insufferable too. So listening to this woman would be endearing if it were'nt so freaking annoying.

I would stop listening but she projects so much, it's difficult to. Instead, I'm listening. And mocking. Yes, very enlightened of me. But if you were here, you'd understand how difficult it is to resist the urge to mock.

Her favourite topic this morning is how if someone can't explain their philosophy or their thesis to the 'average' person of 'average' intelligence, then they don't really understand their philosophy themselves. She lectures at length on the idea, however, when her companion manages to get a word in edgewise to ask her about her thesis she retreats quickly with mumbled comments about it being 'complicated' to explain and loud complaints about red wine and how hung over she is.

Ok. I take it back. It is kind of endearing. Cute, earnest, seeking little philosophy girl.

most inappropriate inspirational quote ever

This was forwarded to me today by someone who, for reasons I'm afraid to put too much thought into (you'll understand when you read the quote), thought of me when they read it:

"The faint of heart never get to screw a wildcat. Go out and live, do things that you are afraid of, and then let go of the outcome".

Let the record show that I have never, not once, even contemplated screwing a wildcat.

Back from a few days of silence and solitude at the cottage where I divided my time between wading in the creek and sitting in 'my' tree out back. What could be more magical than sitting in the calm, wise, enduring embrace of a tree? That a small creek bubbles merrily along just below where I like to sit makes it that much better. It was nice.

It was particularly nice because the morning before I left my mind was full of all kinds of happiness, anger, curiosity, mischief, sadness, quiet, noise, calm and hyperactivity all in the space of seconds. One feeling being replaced by another before I could even register the first. The monkey mind was active.

As I practiced this morning I was thinking about what a difference a month makes. I started thinking about it because I was so. very. tired. The teacher training intensive in July didn't allot time for a personal practice and, although my practice grew in many ways during that month, my stamina for a vinyasa practice is gone. So. This morning as I dragged my sopping, exhausted, winded self through the last quarter of my practice I thought about what a difference that month has made to my stamina.

Then I started thinking about all the other things that have changed in the span of four short weeks. This time last month I had only just returned home, was still in teacher training, still in a relationship, still had a tourist staying with me, was still unemployed, still planning to leave Toronto, still had blond-ish hair, had never assisted anyone in a yoga class, and didn't even know that a lovely cottage lay in my future. This month, of course, none of the above holds true. And next month? Who knows.

By this time in September I'll have already returned to work and I'll have a new tourist staying with me but the rest of it? No idea. Some ideas. Lots of excitement. But no real, make a plan idea. Think I'm finally settling into the fact that this is the way I like it best.

stupid mouse man

Sound the alarms, someone in the building has seen a mouse. My landlord lives for emergencies such as these. He brought a pest control team through today, less than 24 hours after the enemy sighting.

I spent the morning at home wanting to be here when they came through; in part to make sure my landlord didn't nose around too much and in part to gloat that there have been no mouse sightings in my apartment thanks to my lovely kitty-cat roommate. That last bit was particularly important as the cat has been a bone of contention with my landlord since day one. The snide comments and references to evicting me were only silenced when I forwarded section 10.4 of the landlord tenant act which states that you cannot evict a tenant for having a companion pet such as a cat or dog. Needless to say, I was happy to be present to wave my mouse-free flag and point out the benefits of having a four legged roommate.

Then the stupid mouse man came and pointed his flashlight under my sink to point out mouse droppings before swinging the flashlight to the bowl of nearby cat food and stating that mice like cat food. My landlord followed him around the apartment repeating that over and over - "So, they like the cat food huh? Isn't that interesting." No. It's not interesting. And it sounds highly unlikely. A mouse is going to scrabble it's way over the edges of a smooth porcelain bowl to immerse itself in food enjoyed by one of its predators? I don't believe it.

The damage done, the stupid mouse man left behind a couple of poison-filled boxes and assurances that the mice won't die in the house, they'll eat the poison and leave the house in search of water to die a slow agonizing death outside.

I threw the poison boxes away after they left. Shhhh...don't tell anyone....



How could you not love this face?

nothing and something

People keep asking me what I'm going to do in September. When I share that I've agreed to return to my old position on a part-time basis, the next question is what I'm going to do with the other days. I don't know.

No idea. Zip. Zero. Nothing.

I'm the only one from my yoga teacher training program who hasn't already sought out teaching opportunities. Partly because I don't feel ready to lead a class yet and partly because I don't want to. While I don't exactly know what I want to do with my free days this fall, I do know that they involve doing a whole lot of nothing. I also know that it will all make sense in hindsight. There's something in store.

This weekend I assisted my first yoga class. It was a sunset class held in the beaches and it was perfect. I parked my car just off the highway and rollerbladed to the outdoor pavilion where the class was held. Mats were arranged to face the lake, small candles were placed here and there. Practice took place with the magic of the lake in front of us, the sound of people enjoying the summer evening around us and the beauty of the sunset above us. After the practice people stopped to say thank you which surprised and humbled me. I should have thanked them.

After practice I rollerbladed in the darkness back to my car stopping several times to look at the stars, stare the the lake, and check out the recent creations of 'rock balancing guy'. It was perfect.

easy

I've been thinking about the 'easy' joke. The one we repeated over and over, the one about how easy I was. The word with its high school implications made us laugh while, at the same time, it was always said with a touch of surprise. Things were easy between us, we slipped into being together so seamlessly that it was strange but great.

I've been thinking about it and I've decided that you were easy too. You were easy to scare away.

The first time I told you that I was having doubts and needed you to be the strong one, you ended it. The first time I told you I needed distance, you retreated without even trying. The first time I gave in and gave up on us, you didn't even pretend to step forward and pick up the slack. When things stopped being easy between us, you very easily threw in the towel, very easily gave up, very easily decided it wasn't worth fighting for.

You were easy.

Thing is, you were also easy to predict. Before you left you filled the air with talk of things not being over, of wondering what it would be like to live in Toronto, of being confused, but even as you talked I knew. I knew it was over because I knew you wouldn't work for it. It'd been the way of things between us since we got together, I just ignored it. I ignored that it was easy for you to retreat and give up because I didn't want to give us up.

Lately I've been angry with you. Angry that you were so easy to scare away and that you don't care to fight but, really, I'm just angry with myself. I should have let things be easy myself and stopped trying so hard ages ago.

That's easy to see now.

bandaids and chocolate

Today I asked the person I love to stop contacting me. If it's going to hurt, it may as well really hurt so I can feel it, grieve it, process it, and move on. Ripping the bandaid off quickly as opposed to slowly and all that.

As with all procedures for the faint of heart - or the big babies - I'm pairing the choice to really hurt all at once (instead of the long, slow, chatty email kind of hurt) with chocolate. Lots and lots of chocolate to sugarcoat the fact that this is actually happening, that this is actually a breakup - period.

This sucks. Here's to crappy choices and great chocolate.

every silver lining has a touch of grey

Paul McCartney did it. Alanis Morissette did it. David Bowie did it. Heck, even Bob Dylan did it. But the Greatful Dead?

It seems inherently wrong to hear “The Best of of the Greatful Dead” piping through Starbucks’ soundsystem.

“Touch of Grey” is playing. Good song. Good timing too, it reminds me of a high school friend who has been on my mind lately. We used to borrow her parents car to “go to the movies” which in high school code translated to “sneak across the boarder to go to a dead show”.

Every time we heard this song my friend would howl with laughter & tell me that it reminded her of my family. Not because we needed a silver lining or because we were pessimistic enough to think that every silver lining had a touch of grey. Nope.

It was because of the line “the dog has not been fed in years…”.

crap

Having just accepted an offer to return to my old job on a part-time basis, this morning I received an email from a woman I love, at an organization I love, doing a job I thought I could love, asking if I was still interested in a position there.

My gut says not to take it. The timing isn't right. I want to save my energy for other things. My profession insn't supposed to be my focus right now. In going back to my old job, I'm afraid I'm pigeonholing myself even further than I already am. That's my main interest in the new job possibility at this point in time - to keep the door open - as opposed to a geniune desire to enter a new field at this point.

Hmm. I think I already know my answer.

fluffy black dustbunnies

There was a dog in the shala this morning. A tiny, black toy poodle only a few months old and so small that he was shorter than the length of my foot. I know this because he came over to attack it a couple of times.

He was too young to practice so instead of showing us humans what upward and downward dog are really about, he darted around the studio finding all kinds of fascinating things everywhere he looked. Fast little thing. One minute I was in downward dog and the next minute a small black dustbunny was racing towards me only instead of brushing past me, it stopped to lick me.

The dustbunny lives. It was awesome fun.

Note to self: add puppy-watching to swinging on swings, climbing trees and wading in a lake/river to that list of things that lift my soul.

you don't get to know

I'm doing better today.

My bike and I zipped around the city, the city I no longer have to leave, enjoying the bare streets with the cool breeze taking the edge off the hot sun. My bike took me to my new, favourite coffee shop before heading to Fresh for lunch on the patio where I enjoyed a perfect, solitary meal and didn't feel sad once. Not even when I noticed that I was sitting at the same table we'd sat at our last time there. That was after you told me that you loved me but didn't love me enough and I was still bewildered, struggling to understand the "but".

Even though all these weeks later I still don't understand it, I'm doing better today. But you don't get to know that. Maybe it's childish, maybe it's vengeful, maybe it's just plain mean but you don't get to know that I'm doing ok. You lost that right when you decided you couldn't say "I love you" without tacking "but" onto the end. There is no "but" to real love. Don't you know that? So, you don't get to know that at this very moment, I'm doing just fine.

You'll transform "I'm doing better today" to "I'm doing better - period" and you're going to feel better, relieved. You'll never know that I hyperventilated the first night I walked back into the apartment and felt the emptiness of the places you weren't. You'll never know that now I doubt my judgement and wonder how I got us so wrong. You'll never know that tonight while making dinner I remembered the last time I made corn, how I'd put it on the table and then pretended to need the washroom so I could cry in private. And you'll never know that I was hit with a wall of sadness, completely overwhelmed, last night when I walked past the man singing in the video store and realized it had only been one week since you and I walked past and smiled together at him singing away.

You'll never know those things. Instead, you'll feel relieved that you no longer have to feel like the 'bad guy' and that you can forget the confusion of "I love you...but" and return to your remote, untouchable ways. After two weeks of swallowing my sadness, my confusion, to help you through yours, I don't feel like making it easy for you anymore. You're not getting off the hook that easily this time.

I'm doing better today but you don't get to know that.

home?

Head is spinning. Sunny apartment with shiny wooden floors, early morning walk to the subway, streets bare, sun bright, conversations in English everywhere. This is home - this is home? It's both a feeling and a question. Despite the familiarity and love of this place that I know to be home, it feels empty.

The trip through Heathrow was a nightmare, the flight home not much better, and arrivals made far, far worse when half the plane discovered our luggage had been left in London. Home at 8pm Toronto time, 1am UK time, 3am Finland time...I'm not sure which time my body thinks I'm on. Think it'll take a few days for the dust to settle.

sauna

Just returned to Helsinki after a week at the mökki (cottage). The theme of the week this year, as with last (and, I suspect, every visit to the mökki) was the sauna. Carrying wood to the sauna, getting the sauna ready, enjoying the glorious 90+ degrees of that little wooden room, planning the next trip to the sauna and, if you're me, dreading the obligatory dip into the freezing cold lake in between sauna visits.

Everyone at the cottage was very disappointed that the combination of strange weather plus rough water brought lots of algae to the shore making it impossible to 'cool off' in the lake every 10 minutes before returning to the blessedly warm embrace of the sauna. Me? I did a little happy dance. I never understood why the Finn's have to ruin a perfectly lovely experience by tossing themselves into baltic water in the first place.

Finland in June is, quite literally, the land of the midnight sun. These pictures were taken after the evening sauna at about 11:30pm.

Mikko using the elusive Finnish shower tree to bathe after the evening sauna


Me not enjoying the shower tree at all. Cold water. Very cold.


A Canadian and a Finn

the helsinki 's'

When I was a kid, I was painfully shy which, I assure you, I mean as more than a blithe euphemism for 'I was quiet' - I was PAINFULLY shy. I blushed when looked at, cringed when the centre of attention, and cried if required to speak to someone outside of my immediate family. I also had a lisp that may or may not have been that noticeable (or unusual for a seven year old) but I heard it as if through a megaphone whenever speaking the letter 's'. I remember being sent to a speech therapist when I was in grade 3. It was a short visit as she was upset that they'd wasted her time sending a student with a missing front tooth to learn to pronounce 'sssss'. She dismissed me, frustrated, telling me to come back when my tooth had grown in which I took personally, as a failure on my part. Stupid tooth.

I'm still the same person. Still practice my lines before making phone calls, get nervous meeting new people, encourage myself to participate in conversations at parties instead of hanging out by the bookcase checking out their collection but I've learned to manage it well. I've also learned to say the letter 's'. Both were difficult, but I did it.

So imagine my dismay to hear that the way I pronounce the letter 's' is very similar to what I'm told is the "Helsinki 'S'". Given that I'm unable to pronounce half of the other sounds in the Finnish language correctly, I'd normally be pleased to learn that I'm pronouncing something in a typically Finnish way but the Helsinki "S" isn't typically Finnish. It's limited to a segment of the Helsinki population referred to as "pissis", short for "pissaliisa" which translates literally as "Piss-Alice". Yeah.

The internet puts it as this: "pissis is a derogatory term for teenage girls dressing slatternly and acting in an obnoxious and uneducated manner". Years of childhood embarrassment and early adolescent vigilance to learn to pronounce the letter 's' such that I avoid drawing any attention to myself whatsoever and the result is an affiliation with the Finnish version of insipid valley girls dressed in tattered tights, short skirts, tube tops and smeared eye liner, sporting mussed up hair hanging around the railway station drunk out of their minds at 5pm on a Tuesday night. Great.

i wish i was kidding

I saw people wearing gloves this morning as I made my way home from the shala.

Sigh. That's all.

stuff

I realize that I've been writing about days filled with doing nothing and posting pictures showing me laying about doing more of nothing but, inexplicably, I feel as if I'm falling behind. In lieu of a proper (and likely infinitely boring) post, here's a visual update on Helsinki happenings instead...

There's been some big shot European football tournament thingy

Where I learned that pizza, fries, and pop are an international sporting event food phenomenon except here the pizza is topped with tuna, the fries look more like breakfast hashbrowns and the pop is more likely to be beer

There's been some biking

The affair between me and YU-lia continues. We're inseperable and I have to tell you - I think it's love.


There's been some random hot air balloon sightings

Where I was given pause to wonder about Torontonians; about whether, assuming we'd actually hop on our bikes for a leisurely ride along the shores of Lake Ontario after work in the first place, we'd stop and spend 1/2 an hour watching a hot air balloon fill with air and prepare for take off. I have a feeling we'd keep going, hell bent on enjoying our bike ride - dammit - or maybe that'd just be me.


There's been some beach sitting

Me sitting and staring at water. Surprise, surprise.


There's been some visiting

Where I learned that even the one year olds speak more languages than I do. Luckily for me, she forgave me for babbling gibberish at her and deigned to speak to me using the international language of "stuffed animals" (even though that's SO six-months old).

And there's been some decorating to acknowledge an earthday/environmental something or other



The strangeness of waking to find the Parliament steps covered in flowers was added to by the fact that they were Gerber Daisies - a flower I'm more accustomed to seeing in wedding bouquets and table centrepieces.

And there you have it. The weather is gorgeous, the days are long and life is good. Be well everyone. r.

20+ hours of sun and still so cold?

I didn't think it was bothering me, all this sun, after all, I'm the one my mother has always referred to as a "champion sleeper". Sleep is what I do and not much interferes with it, not fire alarms, not my cat pouncing all over me, and certainly not something as insignificant as daylight; so I've responded to all concerned inquiries about my sleeping and comments about how difficult most tourists find it to adjust to 20+ hours of sun with a smug "not me". Yeah. I've discovered a small addendum to that.

I don't have a problem falling asleep to what may look like a sunny afternoon when it is, in fact, 11pm at night but I am having a difficult time staying asleep. You know that feeling when you open your eyes to a much brighter day than normal and you have that full body start accompanied by a feeling of dread knowing you've slept in? I do that pretty much all night, every night from 3am onwards. I wake with a start, look to the window, see how bright it is, and groan because I've totally slept in and I'm going to be totally late and, oh God, what a pain before I realize that a) I'm on holiday, I have nothing to be late for and b) I'm in Finland in the summertime, it always looks like it's 1:00 in the afternoon out.

Last weekend was a visit to Turku where, in addition to marveling over a place where baking bread is a part of normal weekend preparations and trying to follow inside family jokes (in Finnish, no less ;) around the dinner table, we collected photo-evidence of the ridiculous amount of sunlight Finland hogs throughout the summer months.


8:30pm - The riverbank that runs through Turku is lined with restaurant boats, grassy shores and heaps of people engaging in what must be Finland's unofficial national pasttime: picnicking



9:00pm - At the pier engaging in my official personal pasttime: chilling out


10:30pm - On top of the hill, looking out over Turku


And, yes, I am sporting my spring coat and a scarf wrapped several times around my neck; although Finland hogs the majority of sunlight throughout the summer months, it seems that Canada is hogging all of the warmth.

postcards from finland

Julia is fine. I'm not sure how I managed to miss that the handle bars were facing the wrong direction but the person who parked their bike beside me didn't. As I was sitting upstairs bemoaning my 'broken' bike, they were noticing that the front wheel was facing backwards and spinning it around to face the right direction. That's it. Problem fixed. I smile to think of just how many of the things I interpret as 'problems' are also so easily fixed if I could stop bemoaning them and look at them with a more objective eye.

Yesterday the sun came out late in the afternoon and I walked for hours by the ocean enjoying the golden evening sun, watching the kayakers, and listening to the sounds of the city by the ocean. I came across two Canadian geese. REAL Canadian geese, regal with their long, graceful necks as opposed to the strange, squat little birds that have managed to usurp the name here. I was glad to see them, these birds from home, and I stopped to watch them for a while, thinking about how far they'd come. As I sat, a couple of ducks came right up to my feet quacking for food while the geese kept a respectful, safe distance, evaluating the situation from afar before deciding not to bother me - just like any good Canadian.

As I type I listen to a radio station from home streamed over the internet and keep pausing, surprised, when I'm told that it's 2.30am or 29degrees as I automatically look toward the window to confirm before remembering that I'm not there. I'm here.

Here is a good place to be. I toy with wondering why - because I'm on holiday? because the size of the city makes many things easier? because I've none of the responsibilities of home to attend to? because I 'get' people here in a way I don't 'get' people at home? because of the company? It's probably a combination of all of them but, to be honest, I don't spend too much time thinking about it. I've very much checked out and taken a mental as well as literal holiday this last week. It's been better than good.

And, below, an actual postcard from last Sunday: late morning, great yoga, sunny bike ride, and basking in the sun by Toolo Bay before headed to the nearby park for a rollercoaster ride. Perfect.